The story behind Mozarts Requiem of 1791 has been made famous (if not historically accurately so)

by the film Amadeus. Certainly he received a commission to write a Mass for the Dead. The film has Mozart haunted by the ghost of his estranged father; ascribes the commission to the rival Viennese composer, Salieri; and shows that Salieri planned to pass off the greatest Requiem ever written as his own work, once he had obtained it from Mozart, and murdered him. In fact the commission was from one Count Walsegg

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Mozart certainly left the work incomplete the last notes he composed are those in bar 8 of the Lachrymosa. But the sketches he left, and with what his pupil, Sssmayer, knew of his plans, and the gaps which he himself filled in, it was possible to provide a completed Requiem for Count Walsegg, in order for Constanze, Mozarts widow, to collect the fee. No-one knows exactly what happened. But does it really matter when the music itself is so sublime? Scholars know what Mozart definitely wrote down, suspect what he sketched, and conjecture upon what they cant prove. To my mind (and this is of course subjective), the only parts of the work which do not seem to carry the feel of Mozart are the Sanctus, and the Osanna to the Benedictus. Just how much of the rest he completed, dictated, sketched or suggested we shall never know; but those two sections apart, it has an indescribable something, which just seems uniquely like Mozart. There have been several modern attempts at completing/reconstructing the piece, but I think the well-accepted version by Sssmayer respects Mozarts intentions; and he is the only one to have direct contact with Mozart, which must lend significant authority to his work.

The Sparrow Mass is a far less weighty piece. It was written in Salzburg in 1775 or 1776. Correctly known as the Missa Brevis No. 10 in C major, it gains its nickname from the violin figures in the two Hosanna sections. A missa brevis was a concise setting of the text of the mass; but Mozart does not quite follow the convention of writing a fugal passage to conclude the Gloria and the Credo - thereby avoiding the musical formality of such a compositional technique. Following examples by both Joseph and Michael Haydn, Mozaty recalls the music of the Kyrie at the end of the concluding dona nobis pacem giving the work a satisfying unity. Bach did this also in his Magnificat where he repeats the beginning at the end - literally interpreting the words as it was in the beginning Sssmayer does the same in his completion of the Requiem - although it has been suggested that Mozart left a sketch which showed this was his intention.

Interspersed between the Gloria and Credo we will hear one of the Epistle Sonatas. Mozart wrote seventeen of these short instrumental pieces, which were intended to be played to cover liturgical movement between the reading of the Epistle and Gospel. The one we will hear is number 12, written in April 1777, matching in mood and instrumentation the Sparrow Mass and possibly therefore performed by Mozart himself in this context.

The Requiem contains an almost literal quotation from the Sparrow Mass in the Requiem eternal. 18th Century composers were not averse to recycling their music!

These two works belong to the later part of the 18th Century, and make an admirable pairing, both in the way they contrast with, and complement each other. There are moments of drama the Requiem and Kyrie of Mozart are hugely powerful. The Dies irae is terrifyingly stark in its vision of the day of judgement. There is pathos the Lachrymosa (particularly when heard remembering that it is used in Amadeus during the scene of Mozarts funeral) is heart-rending in its beauty. Then in the Sparrow Mass there is exuberance and simplicity, as well (and surely no mistake) as humour in the Hosanna which has given the work its nickname.